Category Archives: Music In Film

As part of our Countdown to The Dark Knight Rises series I was going to simply sing my praises of the Danny Elfman Batman score, which I find to be one of cinema’s most memorable and downright awesome blockbuster soundtracks ever created, but when I thought back to the music in the various cinematic incarnations of the character I realised that most of the scores have been pretty memorable, so instead I bring you Batman music through the ages…

1960’s Batman Theme

You can’t talk about Batman music without including this, which I imagine made an appearance in the 1966 movie:

This review is actually a case of good timing for our Ridley Scott extravaganza rather than a carefully planned post. I’ve been in touch with a specialist promotions firm I’m going to start working with to review soundtracks on my blog and one of the first albums that came up was a new reworking of the soundtrack to Scott’s 1985 fantasy curio Legend.

The score for Legend, like the film, has a complicated history. With Ridley Scott’s film getting manhandled by the studios, the film ended up having a different version in Europe as it did in the US. Due to this the film also ended up having to have two scores produced. The original score was actually by the great Jerry Goldsmith and was used in the European release as well as in a later released directors cut. The original US theatrical and home video releases however had a score composed by German electro/prog-rock legends Tangerine Dream who were brought in late on in post-production to replace Goldsmith’s score. The version I am reviewing is a new re-interpretation of this soundtrack by composer Brandon Verrett.

After being approached to arrange the “Unicorn Theme” from the Tangerine Dream soundtrack for a digital single, Verrett was pleased with the result and had the idea of recreating the entire album. As he puts it, “our original intent was to take the conception of the original Tangerine Dream tracks and arrange them in such a way that they feel organic, earthy, and more contemporary while still capturing the essence of the originals.” The original soundtrack also contained two songs featured in the movie: “Loved by the Sun,” sung by Yes singer Jon Anderson (a lyricized version of “Unicorn Theme”), and “Is Your Love Strong Enough”, performed by Bryan Ferry and heard over the end credits. On this recording, singer Katie Campbell interprets these songs in her own fashion.

Our buddy Gary King (New York Lately, Death of the Dead) keeps on diving from genre to genre so I suppose it only makes sense that at some point a filmmaker like that is going to tackle a musical. King seems to be attacking this one with gusto and a visual flair not often seen in indie film making.

How Do You Write a Joe Schermann Song features all original songs written by Joe Schermann and all performed by the talented cast (Joe Schermann, Christina Rose, Debbie Williams). And you’ll be able to hear the incredible orchestral arrangements written for the songs by composer Ken Lampl.

“This truly has been a memorable collaboration…What I really dig about these songs is that I asked for Joe to create different styles for each lead character. He took it and ran with it. I love these songs. In the film, you will hear his influences of Sondheim, Jason Robert Brown and yes, even Springsteen in them.”

We’re looking forward to finally checking out the film sometime over the next 12 months on the festival circuit (I know for a fact it’s been submitting to many!). Before that, a full fledged trailer should be on its way and today we’ve got a soundtrack preview of some of the songs all set to stills from the film. Take a listen and look to the video below and see what you think.

1. “I WANT” performed by Christina Rose (0:00-0:36)
2. “WRITE ME A LOVE SONG” performed by Christina Rose and Joe Schermann (0:36-1:18)
3. “I FELL IN LOVE” performed by Debbie Williams and Joe Schermann (1:18-1:56)
4. “30 DAYS OF RAIN” performed by Debbie Williams and Joe Schermann (1:56-2:22)
5. “I HATE SUMMER” performed by Christina Rose (2:22-2:46)
6. “MOTH TO THE FLAME” performed by Christina Rose and Debbie Williams (2:46-3:25)
7. “HOW DO YOU WRITE A JOE SCHERMANN SONG” performed by Joe Schermann and Company (3:25-4:43)

Dario Argento’s Suspiria is justly celebrated for its bright, bloody set-pieces and flamboyant use of color, but it’s hard to imagine the movie being nearly as assaultive without the nearly omnipresent overwhelming score from the progressive band Goblin, who also provided the score for several of Argento’s other films. They recorded the music first, then Argento layered it into the film, a technique which works perfectly in this case, blending music into sound design to create sensory overload that matches, and sometimes even surpasses, Argento’s in-your-face visuals.

This is the opening of the film, through the first set-piece, and you can already tell how important the music is going to be, from the initially delicate but creepy as hell main theme up to the frenzy of the horrific first kill. My favorite part of the movie, though, is actually the visually-subdued scene with the blind man and his dog walking into the square – a scene which is terrifying almost solely through the score and sound design. Suspiria beats you senseless with its stylistics (in the best way possible), and the Goblin score is a huge part of that.

For this week’s Music In Film I thought I would highlight one of the first things that came to mind when I thought of use of an existing song (as opposed to a composed score) which kicks things off and sets the tone for the action to come. In this case it’s “Rap das Armas” (aka Rap of Weapons) by Brazilian rap duo Cidinho and Doca (it was originally a song in the ’90s but these guys made it a hit). It is used in the opening scene of José Padilha’s excellent City of God-esque action-crime film Elite Squad (or Tropa de Elite to use its original Portuguese name).

Apart from being a catchy song in its own right which you can easily listen to out with the actual movie itself, like I said it sets the tone up for the rest of the movie. It has a pulsing beat and a strange rhythm as it accompanies an outdoor rave with the titular Elite Squad arriving on the scene to sort things out (when the police need help these are the guys they call!) One of my favourite openings of a movie in the last five years.

For our first entry in our new Music In Film series I thought why not highlight what is probably my favourite film score of all time? Composed by the great duo of Nick Cave and Warren Ellis – who also did The Proposition and The Road – the score for The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward of Robert Ford is a masterclass in setting tone, perfectly encapsulating and emulating the somber, sad and ponderous nature of the film.

Writer/director Andrew Dominik certainly takes his time telling this tale – the film is not only over 150 minutes long but is slow-paced to boot – but the stunning visuals (each frame could be put up on display on your living room wall) and phenomenal performances keep things fascinating. But it’s the score by Cave and Ellis which gives Jesse James its “soft edge,” its enveloping tone, its magical atmosphere.

There are 14 tracks on the soundtrack (19 on the special edition) and Cave and Ellis manage to make each track distinctive and uniquely evocative in their own right but still clearly part of the same overall package. A lot of scores have one overall musical motif that’s basically repeated throughout each track so in that way this score is quite unique.Would you like to know more…?

Recent Comments

Kurt Halfyard: Indeed. It came up due to this wonderful video essay on Heaven’s Gate and The Lone Ranger: https://vimeo.com/120401922 However, I’ve watched Heaven’s Gate multiple times well before this. I even wrote about it in 2004 —...

Jonathan: I always get Millennium Films and Millenium Entertainment mixed up… but both distribute complete trash with some impressive star power. I’m sure these films are relatively high paychecks with short filming commitments and minimal press. Can’t blame...

Jonathan Hardesty: Well, and comparing those films and directors in the context of the new Godzilla film is more interesting than just doling out a star rating and saying that Godzilla was either “good” or “bad.” Or at least I find that discussion more...

Arnold Schizopolis: While watching a film, I often find myself trying to figure out the filmmaker’s vision (themes, concepts and/or thesis) and by the end, wonder if he or she was successful. That’s more challenging for me than whether the film met my expectations....

Jonathan: Yeah, Harrison’s career since ’97 has been astonishing in how much it contrasts with the rest of his career. In the 14 movies he’s starred in since Air Force One, every movie has been god-awful–except 42, which I appreciate for the moderately...

Andrew James: So I like Blade Runner quite a bit – though I seem to be in a minority of people that don’t absolutely adore it. Next Incendies blew me away while Prisoners did very little for me and Enemy was arguably the worst movie of the year. So Villeneuve (for...

Jonathan: In ’95, a Blade Runner sequel came out as a novel – Blade Runner 2: The Edge of Human. I bought it for fifty cents with its cover ripped off at a five ‘n dime. I liked it then, although I was also ten years old–and Deckard was not a replicant...

Rick Vance: It adds to the bleak and overbearing nature of the world and the motives and behaviors of the police office if people who are ‘Blade Runner’ hunt without that knowledge (It also isn’t a question so I am glad we all dodged that bullet). (I agree...

kurt: One Last thing: http://badassdigest.com/2015/0 2/27/do-androids-dream-of-blad e-runner-making-sense “In turning dick’s novel into a film (if paul sammon’s book “future noir” is to be believed) hampton fancher wrote a line in a draft either very late in...

Andrew James: What Kurt said. I don’t take so much “stock” out of it as it just happens to have a lot of classic blind spots for me. Out of the 250, there were about 42 that I hadn’t seen which is just about exactly how many Cinecasts we do per year so...

Kurt Halfyard: He talked about it on the show, it’s as good a populist list as any, and easy to find. A mixture of arthouse (La Strada, Fanny And Alexander, L’Avventura) and populist (Shawshank Redemption, Godfather, American Beauty) as well as old (Gold Rush, Rear...

Rick Vance: I am surprised Andrew has so much stock in the imdb top 250.

Matt Gamble: I don’t think I called it exciting outside of a direct comparison to the fucking Oscars, but I still do find it fun. NXT is a waaaaay better product than Raw or Smackdown , and I watch Ring of Honor on occasion (going to a house show later this month). I...

Craig: I can’t believe Matt thinks WWE is still exciting, I still watch it out a weird sense of obligation more than anything else. He should get on Independent companies like Pro Wrestling Guerilla where his mind would be blown. https://www.youtube.com/wat...

Sean Kelly: I couldn’t disagree more with Andrew on WYRMWOOD, which I had quite a lot of fun watching at Toronto After Dark (it’s definitely a film that must be seen theatrically with a crowd). In my opinion, it’s not “just another zombie movie”...

Dean Speir: I clearly like Miller’s Crossing a great deal more than you do (and am in vociferous disagreement with your affection for that faker Brian DePalma!), and I think one of the problems is that you’re unfamiliar with the novels of Dashiell Hammett,...

Jandy Hardesty: I have the whole Keaton Blu-ray set from Kino. I’ve watched like three shorts from it, and that’s it. I was planning to mainline it when Karina was born, but guess what – silent films do not work well when you’re sleep-deprived, not even...

Bob Turnbull: I thought there were some funny bits to the underwater sequence – fencing with a swordfish (using another swordfish), the men at work sign, the rinsing of a pot with water while underwater, etc. Not uproarious stuff (and, to be honest, not up to the level I...

Jandy Hardesty: I watched The Navigator for my Blind Spot series a couple of years ago – I liked the meet cute sequences between Keaton and the girl the best (the fumbling around the kitchen, and then the incredible devices they rigged up eventually). The underwater...

Andrew James: J.K. Simmons was pretty much declared the winner of best supporting actor since the movie was released. It’s been a lock since day one; everyone knew it. Moore has always been a pretty safe bet as well.

Matt Gamble: Yeah, but I’ve had years to cultivate this idiotic persona.

Matt Gamble: You’re entering into a world of pain, Andrew. Until you have some actual relevant data to measure it is pointless to declare who or what the Oscar favorite is. You know, stats and such. Calling out an Oscar favorite before anyone has placed a single vote is...